<p>I'm just reading yet another thread about safety around the Yale campus. I'm about to take a bunch of HS kids there for a competition. My thought is (we're staying at a hotel near campus) that we tell the kids we're all going out to dinner together and then back to the hotel and they need to stay in the hotel and not leave. These are kids from VT who have zero street smarts. I practically have zero, actually. Though I've lived in NYC and traveled all over the world and worked in "dangerous psych hospitals", etc. I sometimes feel that getting in a car (or rickshaw) is the most dangerous thing we ever do. I know I'm being paranoid, but the few parents who take the kids on trips...I guess we worry.</p>
<p>It's natural to worry. A little worry makes you careful. </p>
<p>Around the Yale campus, New Haven is pretty safe. Away from campus, in the worse neighborhoods, at night, I'd advise people to travel in groups. </p>
<p>You'll see when you're there, it's not as bad as you may have heard.</p>
<p>I think it's very reasonable to have the kids stay in the hotel after dinner. My D was required to do this on high school theater trips to a mid-size state college in a safe town and also on two trips to Europe with a group of students. They don't need to be out at night in these circumstances.</p>
<p>Our (semi rural) hs teams tend to arrange dinner at a place with a game room. The hotel's pool or a movie are other options. Kids are not out unsupervised after dinner.</p>
<p>Even for "street smart" HS schoolers on a class trip, no reason to be wandering any streets at night...stuff happens even in the safest of places</p>
<p>As a teacher who has taken kids on trips before, they are your responsibility. After dinner, we would return to the room, the kids got drinks, etc., from the machines. I did bedcheck, then I placed tape on the doors. One of us sat outside in the hall, and we took turns getting a few hours sleep. Never fun for the chaperones, but that's what the job entails. We visited New Haven during college trip and I didn't feel unsafe anywhere we went, which was linmited to the college and surrounding downtown area.</p>
<p>i'm a petite white girl and i feel perfectly safe walking around downtown (around the yale campus) at night. you just have to be smart, like n ay city.</p>